YOUTH FOR SERVICE

nothing to do we like that on my corner I'd shimmy shimmy Coco go to the mole you can always tell let me paste on every corner I'll look too hard sell them they got gone you got a thousand fellows the king in this tough Sheen the boss because aspiring from some honour at night you can always tell that's the lonely woman bet you some part of the mission and always tale 2008 corner how was the crime they'd be right on deck for adjustment look out oh man look Otto me Mike is on this thing at first light up fellas then caused me anything bad thing has been a quick getaway everybody's obviously [Music] i am stanley Maas Attorney General of the state of California there is no one cause for juvenile delinquency and therefore there is no one cure for juvenile delinquency the elements that go to make up a fine young person in our society are generally threefold 1st loving parents secondly intelligent teachers and thirdly a wholesome environment in which to grow up but all too many of our young people today lacks one two or even all three of these elements and therefore we have what we call juvenile delinquency the community then has an obligation to provide those missing elements when I speak of the community I mean society generally officially and also private organizations which work in this field any private organization that gives to youngsters the opportunity to do something useful and constructive gives them a chance then of belonging of participating of winning the approval and approbation of their elders and of their contemporaries any such organization in our society today is doing a most useful and constructive thing both for the young people and for the community in which they live [Music] well yeah a man with ten twelve O'Clock much for mobility for now there's nothing don't take a look man watch me me down how about five o'clock okay [Music] [Music] well we'll back to the whole plantation [Music] chuckling Terry ain't that sweet will show your house dog always ain't dead Coe give you a little sample we look like Elvis before you witness service those a couple of my good friends there swears looks like the face of Patterson Ingemar but it's not left to right left to the jaw or right to the team's feet to the chairs knife in his back brass knuckle own as he is someone is on the ground someone's gonna ground I think it's the referee no it's not don't get panic ladies don't get panic ladies nothing will happen only in look out keep it clean keep it clean we're gonna team no piece [Music] [Music] what no job but don't worry I know what they are tell you you're too young you're on experience you're not the Union we can't bond you've been in trouble you're not a graduate we can't use you but don't worry don't worry old lady lose the Christmas money purse to be snatched come on man we'll be knocked down and everybody wonder where people but if they don't see you Frank is here safe that's what they believe because you in a club and you win a club jacket duffel you observed right away to the public Dan know some people realize that uh you know just by being on a curve but it but it can be a good thing and a club can be a bad thing yeah but yeah but you have to start off with the right thing they end up right when Carl May started youth for service he realized he could work through the leaders of the jacket clubs at first I went out looked up these boys on the street this is John bird president of the Warlord's a very important club in San Francisco I just put it up to them would they help I told them we needed them and it worked because it was the truth [Music] well gentlemen I'm Carl man with the organization you ever heard of use for service you know this is the organization with all the clubs and you know the warlords and sheiks the turbans the timers and a susannah Raven yeah that's it we'd like to have you guys there and one of the reasons that we started the council and started you for service is to help out people old people sick people handicapped people going in to paint painting jobs for them more calm their work and clean up their places when they need help and we've got a young we've got a family now to meet some help and we want to go there next week next Saturday so well what do you think will you guys go huh or to run turtle hill hey we'll pick you up in the morning this is the youth for service work project these boys are working for nothing doing something for somebody else who needs help why are they doing the answer is that these boys are no different than the rest of us they need to be needed they may have had less chance than most of us to relate constructively to the community they need the opportunity to work for status and recognition in youth for service we take them as they come we do not judge them for anything that may have done or fail to do in the past we do not excommunicate them if they fail to live up to our standards of work or conduct what we do is accept them as individuals and put them to work we ask them for help and who can resist that [Music] [Music] another project built a new parking area for a community center youth for service is not a training program for future employment but it does give the opportunity to learn something of new skills work projects are referred from many sources chiefly from social agencies the department's of public health and Public Welfare the Visiting Nurses Association the Family Service Society and others the entire Youth for service program has been made possible through generous help from church groups businessmen school and civic authorities and private as well as public agencies [Music] the boys of youth for service have helped many elderly and handicapped people with home chores and repairs they cannot manage themselves when this project started I figured that if what I believe is true then people who have known bitterness and despair and frustration will have every bit as much human understanding as the most enlightened people has supposedly enlightened people that their work around [Music] [Music] many spanish-speaking people live here in Alviso near San Jose a youthful service project helped finish a classroom in the church to be used for English classes sure the boys mess up on a lot of things when they're on their own but they get something done and what they do is their achievement they can learn from it and be proud of it adult control or adult guidance really means the imposition of authority and that would kill the whole idea the boys know that this is their program and that it's in their hands not ours they respond to that you know you can ask a person to do something and you'll see a difference in the word because if you ask me to do it I'll do a better job I'll do anything if somebody asked me but if you say do this do that if you don't do it well you better do it well I just won't do it and I want to see what somebody's gonna do if I don't do it [Music] [Applause] [Music] this give of their strength and time and skill and the community gives to and both get back more than they give a sense of sharing and the boys get something they greatly need tangible evidence of community confidence in them expressed in terms of good materials and efficient and valuable equipment and a good lunch on the job is a pretty well understood form of moral support also the word is recognition the boys of youth for service work hard without pay most of them have very little themselves yet they volunteer repeatedly to help other people in need recognition and community support become very important to maintain morale a little publicity for work well done is small payment by the community for services generously given a party was organised to celebrate the first hundred work projects completed in spiteful Opposition concerning law and order the party did go off quite smoothly after all enjoyed by several hundred youth for service participants and their dates [Music] only one slight mishap was reported a policeman somehow lost his bag [Music] [Music] a council of youth clubs from all parts of the city developed directly from the contacts made on work projects the boys themselves decided they wanted a common meeting ground where they could adjust differences between the clubs before they blow up into Rumbles they also wanted to promote Social Affairs and special projects on a citywide basis both prestige and security were involved in belonging to the organization one of the first council projects developed in support of the national youth march for integrated schools held in washington DC in April 1959 the boys in youth for service know that integration is not just the struggle of American Negroes for equality but it's linked with the fight against discrimination of all newly-arrived minority groups a hundred years ago the Irish made up less than one-third of the population of New York but they were charged with over two-thirds of the arrests there were newcomers then today the Puerto Ricans the Mexican the Pacific and Oriental peoples the newcomers the youth for service council raised the money to send a delegate to Washington the only one sent by a San Francisco Youth Organization and he carried petitions gathered by many other groups as well with some signatures [Music] and still in America some people are treated like newcomers in their own native country called them Indians this is the Leighton bill Rancheria of the Pomo Indian tribe in the redwood forests a hundred miles north of San Francisco one of the largest youth for service projects was the building of a bridge across a riverbed on this reservation to give the Indians access to a large section of their land previously cut off during the rainy season [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] a lot of people get confused about this youth for service thing they tend to lump people into categories or groups there are people who think of youth for service as a youth serving agency purely in terms of juvenile delinquency prevention well if it works that way that's fine but that's not our primary focus that's not what we're here for accepting individuals that's what makes the whole thing meaningful when it comes right down to it we have no political axe to grind no religious axe to grind no social axe or anything except that we are trying to reconcile differences between people and that's what this whole project is about reconciling differences as well as doing something useful [Music] [Music] we have a choice in dealing with these boys of continuing the old community policy of suspicion surveillance rejection and were the usual results or we can take a new look at them and our own attitudes and start to assume our just obligation as citizens and helping them achieve recognition and responsibilities in the community youth for service offers one way to work toward this end [Music] well the bridge is built youth for service nobody least of all the friend thinks this program is a cure-all for anything if it does mean something it'll be what the boys make it me with our health [Music]